Digital facilitation centres provide support to families for book vouchers
A special morning at the Melissa Bassi Comprehensive School in Tor Bella Monaca, which hosts one of the digital facilitation centres co-designed and co-managed by Fondazione Mondo Digitale ETS and Roma Capitale. In a still semi-deserted Rome, facilitators were already at work helping families with applications for book vouchers and contributions for school materials, available until 12 September [read the news item Book vouchers for Roman families].
The parents who turned to the Melissa Bassi Centre were featured in a report by TGR Lazio, by correspondent Tommaso Cherici, which aired yesterday in the 2 p.m. edition on Rai Tre. The report highlighted the latest developments: this year, Roma Capitale has increased both the amount and the method of payment of the subsidy. Citizens can go directly to participating bookshops with the voucher in PDF format, without having to pay in advance. The amounts have been increased: from €173 to €200 for first-year secondary school pupils, second- and third-year secondary school pupils and IeFP (band 1), and from €150 to €170 for second- and third-year secondary school pupils, second-, fourth- and fifth-year secondary school pupils and IeFP (band 2).
Councillor Claudia Pratelli (School, Training and Employment of Rome Capital), interviewed by TGR Lazio, invited families to apply for the voucher:
"Dear parents, dear students, you have an important aid to combat the high cost of schooling and, from this year, an additional tool. You can contact the digital facilitation centres, which will help you fill out the online application. These are amounts that are made available immediately and can be used to purchase books, teaching materials, and digital materials. [...] Take advantage of this opportunity. We look forward to seeing you at the digital facilitation centres!"
On behalf of Fondazione Mondo Digitale, Cecilia Stajano spoke to the media about the work of the Centres:
“Here, every citizen aged between 14 and 74 can find support and assistance, as well as free training, digital services and information. Today, as we have seen, we are mainly dealing with requests for book subsidies, but we support people in many other ways, from applying for SPID (the Italian digital identity system) to creating an email account or accessing the electronic register”.
